The captives had been recognised, and had been set at liberty. They had scarcely got a few yards from the police station, when Juve took the journalist's arm.
"Let's make haste!" he cried. "This foolish arrest has made us lose precious hours."
"You have a plan, Juve? What is it?"
"We must now turn our attention to Josephine; we must use her as a bait to catch the others. The girl won't be much longer at Lâriboisière. She will be extremely anxious to leave that place and——"
"And go back to clear herself of treachery in Loupart's eyes? Is that it?" added Fandor.
"Exactly. Accordingly here is our plan of action. I must go at once to the Prefecture and advise M. Havard of our adventure. Meanwhile you go to the hospital. Contrive to see Josephine, make sure she has not left, watch her and then—wait for me; in two hours, at the latest, I shall be with you."
"All right, Juve, you can reckon on me. Josephine shall not escape me."
Fandor was already moving off when Juve called him back.
"Wait! If ever for one reason or another you want an appointment with me, telegraph to the Safety, room 44, in my name. I will see that the messages always reach me."
A quarter of an hour later Fandor was turning into the Rue Ambroise Paré, when all at once as he passed a woman he gave a start.
"Hullo!" he cried; "that's something we didn't bargain for!..."
The woman walked along the Boulevard Chapelle toward the Boulevard Barbès. Fandor followed her.
When the great clock which adorns the main front of the Lâriboisière buildings struck six, the nurses in the hospital were busy finishing their preparations for the night.
The surgeon in Dr. Patel's division was just concluding his evening visit to the patients. With a word of encouragement and cheer he passed from bed to bed until he reached the one at theend of the ward. The young woman occupying it was sitting up.
"So you want to be off," exclaimed the surgeon.
"Yes, doctor."
"Then you're not comfortable here?"
"Yes, doctor, but——"
"But, what? Are you still afraid?"
"No, no."
The patient spoke these last words so confidently that the surgeon could not help smiling.
"Do you know," he observed, "that in your place I should be much less confident. What are you going to do? Where do you think of going when you leave here? Come, now, you are still very weak; you had much better spend the night here. You could go to-morrow morning after the round at eleven. It would be much more rational."
The young woman shook her head and replied curtly:
"I want to go now, sir, at once."
"Very good. They will give you your ticket."
The doctor gone, the young woman quickly jumped out of bed and began to dress herself.
"You don't suppose I'm going to stay here a minute longer than I have to," she grumbled witha laugh to her neighbour, who was watching her preparations with an envious eye.
"Some one waiting for you?"
"Sure there is. Loupart won't be pleased that I'm not back yet."
"Are you going from here to his place?"
"You bet I am."
This she said in a tone that showed plainly she found the thing quite natural. The other was not of her mind.
"Oh, well, I should be scared only at the thought of seeing that man. You were jolly lucky not to have been killed by him. And when he has got hold of you——"
But Josephine laughed merrily.
"My dear," she said, "you don't know what you're saying. Depend on it, if Loupart didn't kill me it's because he didn't want to. He's a splendid shot. I suppose he had his reasons for not wanting me to stay here; I don't know his affairs, and besides, I came here without consulting him."
A vigorous "hush" from the nurse on duty stopped the conversation.
Josephine meanwhile completed her toilet. A nurse had brought her back the clothes she wore when she entered the hospital. She slipped on a poor muslin skirt, laced her bodice, buttoned herboots and set her curls straight; she was ready.
"I'm off," she cried gaily to the porter as she held out her pass to him. "Thank the Lord, I'm going, and I have no fancy to come back to your hotel!"
Once in the street, Josephine walked quickly. She cast a glance at the clock at a cabstand, and found she was behind time.
She went along the Rue Ambroise Paré, then turned on to the outer boulevards.
The dinner-hour being at hand, the populous streets of the Chapelle quarter were at their lowest ebb of animation. The bookshops had long since released their employees, the cafés were giving up their customers. Fandor, having recognised Josephine, followed her closely as she passed the outer boulevards, then by Boulevard Barbès.
"Beyond a doubt she is bound for the Goutte d'Or," he muttered.
Some minutes later, sure enough, she reached her home.
"Very good! The bird is back in the nest: My job is now to watch the visitors who come to call on her."
Opposite Josephine's door there was a wine-shop. This Fandor entered.
"Writing materials, please," he ordered. "Imust drop a line to Juve," he thought. "We must begin to set the trap."
He was busy drawing up a detailed plan of the neighbourhood when, on raising his head, he gave a violent start, and, throwing a coin on the table, rushed out of the shop.
"She is well disguised, but there's no mistaking her!"
Without losing sight of the woman he was watching, Fandor reached the Metropolitan Station.
"Good Lord! What does this mean?" he muttered. "Where is she off to? She's taking a first-class ticket. Can she have an appointment with Chaleck?" He also took a ticket behind the young woman and reached the platform.
"I'm going where she goes," he thought. "But where the devil are we bound for?"
Loupart's mistress was the embodiment of a charming Parisian.
Her gown was tailor-made, of navy blue, plain but perfectly cut; she wore little shoes with high heels, and no one would have recognised in the well-dressed woman, who got out of the Metropolitan at the Lyons Station, the burnisher, who, a little while ago, had left Lâriboisière.
Josephine had scarcely taken a few steps on the great Square which divides Boulevard Diderot from the Lyons Station, when a young man, quietly dressed, came toward her. He ogled her, then in a voice of marked cordiality, said:
"Can I say a few words to you?"
"But, sir——"
"Two words, mademoiselle, I beg of you."
"Speak," she said at last, after seeming to hesitate, halting on the edge of the pavement.
"Oh, not here; surely you will accept a glass?"
The young woman made up her mind:
"Very well, if you like."
The couple directed their steps toward a neighbouring "brasserie," and neither the young man nor Josephine dreamed of noticing that a passer-by entered the place in their wake.
Fandor did not take a seat at one of the little tables outside, but made for the interior, cleverly finding means to watch the two in a glass.
"Is this the person Josephine was to meet?" he wondered. "Can he be a messenger of Loupart's? Yet she did not seem to know him. Hullo!"
Just as the waiter was bringing two glasses of wine to the table where Josephine and her partner had seated themselves, the young woman suddenly arose, and, without taking leave, made for the door.
Fandor managed to pass close to the deserted man. He heard the waiter jokingly say:
"Not very kind, the little lady, eh?"
"I should think not! Didn't take her long to give me the slip."
Then in a tone of regret the young man added: "Pity, she was a nice little thing."
"That's all right," thought Fandor. "Now I know that Josephine accepted the drink because she thought he was sent by Loupart or one of the gang. Once enlightened as to his real object, she left him abruptly."
Tracking the young woman, Fandor now felt sure he was going to witness an interesting meeting. Josephine, however, seemed in no hurry. She inspected the illustrated papers in the kiosks, and presently reached the box where platform tickets are distributed; having taken one, she sat down near the foot of the staircase which leads to the refreshment rooms. Behind her Fandor also took a ticket, and, going up the stairs, leaned against the balustrade.
"I am waiting for some one," he said to the waiter who appeared. "You may bring me a cup of coffee."
Scarcely five minutes had passed, when Fandor saw a shabby looking man approach Josephine and begin an earnest conversation.
The man drew from his pocket a greasy note-book. From it he took a paper which he handed to the young woman, who promptly put it away in her handbag.
Fandor was puzzled.
"Where was she going? Why did this person hand her a ticket?"
The man pointed to a train where passengers were already taking their seats.
"The Marseilles train! So Loupart has left Paris!"
Then he called a messenger.
"Go and get me a first-class ticket to Marseilles. Here is money. Is there a telegraph office near at hand?"
"On the arrival platform, sir."
"Right. I will give you a message to take; go and hurry back."
Fandor took out his note-book and scrawled a message:
"Juve, Prefecture of Police, Room 44."Have met Josephine and followed her. She is off first class, by Marseilles train. Don't know her destination. Will wire you as soon as there's anything fresh.
"Juve, Prefecture of Police, Room 44.
"Have met Josephine and followed her. She is off first class, by Marseilles train. Don't know her destination. Will wire you as soon as there's anything fresh.
"Fandor."
"Tickets, please."
The guard took the one offered by Fandor.
"Excuse me, sir, there's a mistake here," he said.
"This train doesn't go to Marseilles?"
"The train, yes, but not the last carriage in which you are, for it is bound for Pontarlier, and will be slipped at Lyons from this express."
Fandor was nonplussed. The essential was to follow Josephine, ensconced in the compartment next to his.
"Well, I'll get into another carriage when we are off; it's so easy with the corridors."
"You can't do that, sir," insisted the guard. "While all the carriages for Marseilles in the front of the train communicate, this one is separated from them by a baggage car."
"Then I'll change later, during the night. I have till Dijon, haven't I?"
"You have."
The guard went away. Fandor suddenly asked himself:
"Has Josephine made a mistake, too? Or has she a definite purpose in being in a carriage which is to be slipped from the Southern Express at Dijon to go on toward the Swiss frontier?"
The guard was looking at tickets in Josephine's compartment. Fandor went near to listen; he heard the tail of a conversation between the fair traveller, her companion and the guard. The latter declared as he withdrew:
"Exactly so, you shall not be disturbed."
When Josephine had boarded the train, Fandor had not ventured to watch her too closely, nor the companion she had met on the platform at the last moment. He now decided to take advantage of the corridor to take a look at the man.
He was quite stout, rather common in appearance, although with a prosperous air. A man of middle age, whose jolly face was framed in a beard, giving him the look of an old mariner. Moreover, he was one-eyed.
Josephine was playful, full of smiles and amiability, but also somewhat absent-minded.
The pair had decidedly the appearance of being lovers.
Although it was quite early, passengers were arranging to pass the night as comfortably as possible. The lamps had been shaded with their little blue curtains, and the portières, facing the corridors, had been drawn.
Fandor returned to his compartment. Two corners of it were already occupied—the two furthest away from the corridor. One was in possession of a man about forty, with a waxed moustache, having the air of an officer in mufti, the other was taken by a young collegian with a waxen complexion.
The journalist determined to keep awake, but scarcely had he settled himself when drowsiness crept over him. Rocked by the regular motion of the train he sank into a slumber troubled by nightmares. Then suddenly he sprang up. He had the clear impression of some one brushing by him and opening the door to the corridor.
"Who is there?" he murmured in a voice thick with sleep and drowned by the rush of the train. No one answered him. He staggered out into the corridor. At the far end of the carriage a passenger, with a long black beard, was standing smoking a cigar, and apparently studying the murky country. Not a sound came from Josephine's apartment. With a shrug of his shoulders and cursing his fears, Fandor returned to his own seat.
Why should he fancy, because he was following Josephine, that all the passengers in the train were cut-throats and accomplices of Loupart's mistress? Yet, five minutes after these sage reflections, Fandor started again; he had distinctly seen, passing along the corridor, two fellows with villainous faces and suspicious demeanour. One of them cast into Fandor's compartment such a murderous glance that it made the journalist's heart palpitate.
Fandor glanced at his companions. The officer was sleeping soundly, but the young fellow, although keeping perfectly still, opened his eyes from time to time and cast uneasy glances about him, then pretended to sleep as soon as he caught Fandor watching him.
The train slackened speed; they were entering Laroche Station; there was a stop to change engines. The officer suddenly awoke and got out. The compartment holding Josephine and her companion was thrown open, and, strange to say, his neighbour, the collegian, had moved into it, sitting just opposite the stout gentleman.
Fandor, with a view to keeping awake, abandoned his comfortable seat and settled himselfin one of the hammocks in the corridor. He chose the one just opposite Josephine's door. But so great was his weariness that he quickly fell into a deep sleep. Suddenly a violent shock sent him rolling to the cross-seat in Josephine's compartment. As he picked himself up in a dazed condition, a cry of terror broke from his lips. Three inches from his head was the muzzle of a revolver held by a big ruffian wearing a mask, who cried:
"Hands up, all!"
Fandor and his companions were too amazed to immediately obey, and the command came again, more forcible.
"Hands up, and don't stir or I'll blow out your brains."
And now a gnome-like individual appeared, also masked.
The first one turned to Josephine: "You, woman, out of here!"
Without betraying by her expression whether or no she was his accomplice, Josephine hurriedly left her place and, slipping between the gnome and the colossus, went and cowered down at the end of the carriage.
"Go on!" suddenly commanded the big ruffian, who seemed to be the leader. "Go on! rifle 'em!"
The gnome, with wonderful adroitness, ransacked the coat and waistcoat pockets of the traveller. The stout man, shaking with alarm, made no resistance. After relieving him of his watch and pocketbook, they forced him to undo his shirt. Around his waist he wore a broad leather belt.
"Go it, Beaumôme, relieve him of his burden, the fat jackass!"
From the body of the traveller, the stolen belt passed to the big masked robber, who weighed the prize complacently. The belt contained pockets stuffed with gold and bank notes. The two robbers then moved away toward the further end of the carriage.
Fandor, furious at being tricked like the simplest of greenhorns, determined to seize the occasion to give the alarm.
The emergency bell was immediately above the pale-faced collegian. With a bound the journalist sprang for it, but fell back with a loud cry as he felt a sharp pain in his hand. The collegian had leaped up and cruelly bitten his finger. So great was the pain that Fandor swooned for a few seconds, and that gave his assailant time to cross the compartment and reach the corridor. At this moment the express slackened its speed and slowly came to a standstill.
"Is it too high to jump?"
Fandor knew the voice: it was Josephine's.
"No," answered some one. "Let yourself go. I'll catch you."
The sound of heavy shoes on the footboard told him that the robbers were making off. Josephine went with them, so she was their accomplice. The journalist sprang into the corridor to rush in pursuit. But he recoiled. A shot rang out, the glass fell broken before him, and a bullet flattened above his head in the woodwork.
It now seemed to him that the train was gradually gathering way again. Fandor put his head through the broken glass and searched the darkness outside.
"Ah!" he cried in amazement. There was no longer a train on the track, or rather, the main body of the train was vanishing in the distance, while the carriage in which he was and the rear baggage car had pulled up. Apparently the robbers had broken the couplings.
At the moment, the stout man, having quite recovered, drew near Fandor and observed the situation.
"Why, we're backing! We're backing!" he bellowed with alarm.
"Naturally, we're going down a slope," calmly replied Fandor. The other groaned and wrung his hands.
"It's appalling! The Simplon express is only twelve minutes behind us!"
Fandor now realized the frightful danger. Without delay he made for the carriage door, ready to jump and risk breaking his bones rather than face the terrible crash which seemed inevitable. But before he could make up his mind to the leap, a grinding noise became audible. The guard in the baggage car had applied the Westinghouse brakes and in a few minutes they came to a stop.
Fandor and the stout gentleman sprang frantically out of the carriage, and two brakemen jumped from the baggage car, crying: "Get away! Save yourselves!"
Clambering over the ties, they jumped a hedge, floundered in a hole full of water, scratching their hands and tearing their clothes; they rolled down a grassy slope, stuck in a ploughed field, then dropped to the ground, motionless, as a fearful din burst like thunder on the hush of the night. The Simplon express, racing at full speed, had crashed into the two carriages left on the rails and smashed them to bits, while the engine and forward carriages of the train were telescoped.
Scarcely had Loupart received Josephine in his arms, as she jumped from the carriage, than he strenuously urged his companions to make haste.
"Now, then, boys, off we go, and quickly, too! Josephine, pick up your skirts and get a move on!"
It was a dark night, without moon, favourable to the robber's plans. For a good fifteen minutes the ill-omened crew continued their retreat by forced march. From time to time Loupart questioned the "Beard":
"This the way?"
The other nodded assent: "Keep on, we'll get there."
At length they descried the white ribbon of a road winding up the side of the low hill and vanishing in the distance into a small wood.
"There's the track," declared the Beard.
"To Dijon?"
"No, to Verrez."
"That's a good thing; now, stop and listen to me."
Loupart sat down on the grass and addressed them.
"It's been a good stroke, friends, but unfortunately it's not finished yet. They took precautions we couldn't foresee. We have only part of the fat. We share up to-morrow evening."
He was answered by growls of disappointment.
"I said to-morrow evening," he repeated. "Those who aren't satisfied with that can stay away. There'll be all the more for the others. Now, we must separate. Josephine, you, the Beard and I will get back together. There's work for us in Paris. The others scatter and take care not to get pinched; be back in the nest by ten."
Loupart motioned to the Beard and Josephine to follow him.
"Show us the way, Beard."
"Where to?"
"The telegraph office."
"What's up?"
"Why, you idiot," replied Loupart, "we've been robbed! The wine-dealer's notes are only halves! The swine insured himself for nothing."
The Beard broke out into recriminations.
"To have a hundred and fifty notes in your pocket, and they good for nothing! There was no such thing as Providence! It was sickening."
"Come, don't get angry, two halves will make a whole."
"You know where to lay hands on the rest?"
"Yes, old man."
"That's our job to-morrow evening? That's why you're chasing to the telegraph office?"
Loupart clenched his fists.
"That and something else; there's bigger game afoot."
"What?"
"Juve."
"Oh, the devil!" murmured the Beard, divided between pleasure and fear. "You've got the beggar?"
"I have."
"Sure?"
"Sure."
The little group moved forward in silence. At length Josephine began to tire.
"Say, have we much further to go?"
"No," replied the Beard. "Verrez village is behind that hill. The main road runs by the row of poplars."
"All right. Go and wait there with Josephine. I'll catch you up in a quarter of an hour," ordered Loupart. "I've a wire to send off."
His acolytes gone, Loupart resumed his way. As a measure of precaution, he took off his jacket, turned it inside out and put it on again. The jacket was a trick one: the lining was a different colour and the pockets differently placed.
On reaching Verrez, Loupart turned round. From the top of the little hill he could see, in the distance, the reddening flames.
"That's going all right," thought the wretch; "the Simplon express has run into the cars. There must be a fine mix-up there."
Reaching the post-office at last, he seized a blank and wrote on it hastily:
"Juve, Inspector of Safety, 142 Rue Bonaparte, Paris. All is well; found gang complete, including Loupart. Robbery committed but failed. Cannot give details. Be at Bercy Stores alone, but armed, to-morrow at eleven at night, near the Kessler House cellars.
"Juve, Inspector of Safety, 142 Rue Bonaparte, Paris. All is well; found gang complete, including Loupart. Robbery committed but failed. Cannot give details. Be at Bercy Stores alone, but armed, to-morrow at eleven at night, near the Kessler House cellars.
"Fandor."
The clerk held out her hand to take the message. The bandit was extremely polite.
"Be so good as to pay special attention to thismessage. Read it over, madam. You grasp the importance of it? You see it must be kept absolutely secret. I rely on you."
Ten minutes' quick walking brought Loupart once more to Josephine and the Beard.
"Hullo!" he cried. "Anything new?"
"Nothing."
"Josephine, go down the hill and the first motor that passes, set to and howl; call 'help' and 'murder'; got to stop it. Be off! Look sharp!"
Some minutes passed. The two men watched Josephine go down the road and hide in one of the ditches.
"Your barker is ready, Beard?"
"Six plugs, Loupart."
"Good! You go to the right, I to the left."
Loupart had scarcely given these orders, when, on the horizon, a bright gleam became visible, growing larger every minute, while the noise of a motor broke the silence of the open country.
Loupart laughed.
"Look, Beard. Acetylene lamps, eh? That car will do our job splendidly."
An automobile was fast nearing them. As it passed by Josephine, she rushed into the road, uttering piercing cries.
"Help! Murder! Have pity! Stop!"
With a hasty movement the chauffeur, taken aback by the sight of a woman rising unexpectedly on the lonely road, made a dash at his brakes. Meanwhile from the inside of the car a traveller leaned out.
"What is it? What's the matter?"
As the car was about to stop, Loupart and the Beard rushed out.
"You take the passenger!" cried the former; "I'll attend to the chauffeur."
The two brigands sprang on the footboards.
"No tricks, or I'll shoot! Josephine, truss these fowls for me!" cried Loupart.
Josephine took a roll of cord from her lover's pocket and tied the two victims firmly while Loupart gagged them.
"Now, Beard, take them into the field and give them a rap on the head to keep them quiet."
Then he got into the car and skilfully turned it round. When Josephine and the Beard were on board, he got under way at full speed with a grim smile.
"And, now, Juve, it's between us two!"
While Loupart and his mates were making off across country the disaster occurred. At a curve in the track the Simplon Express coming at full speed charged the cars and crushed them, then, lifted by the shock, the engine reared backwards on its wheels and fell heavily, dragging down in its fall a baggage car and the first two carriages coupled behind it. Then rose in the night cries of terror and the frantic rush of the passengers who fled from the luxurious train.
Fandor picked himself up and went forward. From the tender of the engine a cloud of steam escaped with hoarse whistlings.
The driver held out his two broken arms.
"Give me a hand, for God's sake! Open the tap! There, that hoisted bar. Lift it up. Quick, the boiler is going to burst."
Fandor was still engaged in carrying out this man[oe]uvre when succour began to arrive.
The stoker, less seriously hurt than the driver, had managed to drag himself clear of the wreckage, which was beginning to catch fire. The head guard, and those passengers whose seats had been at the rear of the train, hurried up and the combined effort at rescue began. They searched for the injured and put out the incipient blazes.
Instinctively those who had fled from the train followed in a frantic stampede the road at the foot of the embankment, reached Verrez village out of breath and gave the alarm.
The countryside was soon in an uproar. Lights flashed, torches and lamps of vehicles harnessed in haste: a quarter of an hour after the disaster half the neighbourhood was afoot from all quarters.
"A bit of luck, sir," remarked the conductor, still pallid with horror, to Fandor, "that the collision happened at the curve where our speed was slackened. Ten minutes sooner and all the carriages would have been telescoped."
"Yes, it was luck," replied the journalist, as he wiped his face, covered with soot and coal dust. "The two carriages telescoped were almost empty."
From a neighbouring way-station the railwayofficials had telephoned news of the accident. The section of line was kept clear by telegraph. Word came that a relief train was being made up, and would arrive in an hour.
Fandor had quickly regained his coolness, and was one of the first to lend a hand in the rescue, turning over the wreckage and setting free the injured.
As he passed along the track, he was attracted by the appeals of a stout man, who hurried toward him, wailing:
"Sir! Sir! What a terrible calamity!"
Fandor recognised his fellow-passenger, Josephine's lover.
"Yes, and we had a lucky escape. But what has become of your wife?"
In using the word "wife" Fandor was under no illusion; he merely wanted to interview the other.
"My wife? Ah, sir, that's the terrible part of it. She's not my wife—she's a little friend, and now it's all bound to come out. My lawful wife will hear everything. As for the girl, I don't know what has become of her."
"She knew that you were carrying money?"
"Yes, sir. I am an agent for wines at Bercy, and I was going to pay over dividends to stock-holders, one hundred and fifty thousand francs.I recognised one of my men among the robbers, a cooper. He knew that every month I travel, carrying large sums of money. I am quite sure this robbery was planned beforehand."
"And who are you, sir?"
"M. Martialle, of Kessler & Barriès. Fortunately the money is not lost."
"Not lost! You know where to find the robbers?"
"That I do not, but they have only the halves of the notes. These are worth nothing to them unless they can lay their hands on the corresponding halves. It's a way of cheap insurance."
"And where are the other halves of the notes?"
"Oh, in a safe place, in the office of the firm at Bercy."
Fandor abruptly left M. Martialle and approached an official.
"When will the line be cleared?"
"In an hour's time, sire."
"There'll be no train for Paris till then?"
"No, sir."
Fandor moved off along the track.
"That's all right, I can make it. I'll have time to send a wire toThe Capital."
The journalist sat down on the grass, took out his writing-pad and began his article. But he had overrated his strength. He was worn out,body and soul. He had not been writing ten minutes when he dropped into a doze, the pencil slipped from his fingers and he was fast asleep.
When Fandor opened his eyes, the twilight was beginning to come down. It was between five and six o'clock.
"What a fool I've been! I've made a mess of the whole business now," he cried as he ran frantically to the nearest station.
"How soon the first train to Paris?"
"In two minutes, sir: it is signalled."
"When does it arrive?"
"At ten o'clock."
Fandor threw up his hands.
"I shall be too late. I haven't time to wire Juve and warn him. Oh! what an idiot I was to sleep like that!"
Juve passed the whole day at the Cité Frochot. Despite the precautions taken to keep the failure two days back a secret, the papers had got wind of the drama:The Capitalitself had spoken of it, though without naming his fellow-worker. The staff of that paper was unaware that Fandor was the other man who had so marvellously escaped from the sewer. Blood-curdling tales were told about Doctor Chaleck, Juve, Loupart, the house of the crime, the affair at the hospital; but to anyone familiar with the actual happenings, the newspaper accounts were very far from giving the truth.
And Juve, far from contradicting these misstatements, took a delight in spreading them broadcast.
It is sometimes useful to set astray the powerful voice of the Press so as to give a false security to the real culprits.
However, when masons, electricians and zinc-workers were seen to take possession of Doctor Chaleck's house and begin to turn it upside down, a crowd quickly assembled to witness the performance.
It was with great difficulty that Juve, who did not want too many witnesses round the place, organised arrangements of a vigorous character.
Installed in the drawing-room on the ground floor, he first had a long interview with the owner of the house, M. Nathan, the well-known diamond broker of the Rue de Provence. The poor man was in despair to think his property had been the scene of the extraordinary events which were on everybody's tongue. All he knew of Doctor Chaleck was that that gentleman had been his tenant just four years, and had always paid his rent regularly.
"You didn't suspect," asked Juve in conclusion, "the ingenious contrivance of that electric lift in which the doctor placed a study identically similar to the real one?"
"Certainly not, sir," replied the worthy man. "Eighteen months ago my tenant asked permission to repair the house at his own expense; as you may suppose, I granted his request at once. It must have been at that time that the queer contrivance was built. Have I your permissionto go down to the cellars and ascertain their condition?"
"Not before to-morrow, sir, when I shall have finished my inspection," replied Juve, as he saw M. Nathan out.
The inspector was assisted in his investigation by detectives Michel and Dupation. They interviewed the old couple in charge of the Cité and various neighbours of Doctor Chaleck, but without lighting upon a clue. Nobody had seen or heard anything whatever.
Toward noon he and Michel, who did not wish to leave the house, decided to have a modest repast brought to them. M. Dupation, a fidgety official, took this chance of getting away.
"Well, gentlemen," he declared, "you are much more up to this business than I, and besides my wife expects me to luncheon. You don't need any further help from me?"
Juve reassured the worthy superintendent and gave him permission to go. He was only too glad to find himself alone with his lieutenant. The workmen who were repairing the caved-in basement of the little house were already gone, and there was no chance of their being back before two o'clock. Thus Juve found himself alone with Michel.
"What I can't understand, sir," said Michel,"is the telephone call we got toward morning from here asking for help at the office in the Rue Rochefoucauld. Either the victim herself 'phoned, and in that case she did not die, as we think, in the early part of the night, or it was not she, and then——"
Juve smiled.
"You are right in putting the problem that way, but to my mind it is easy to solve. The call was not given by the murdered woman for, remember, when we raised the body at half-past six it was already cold. Now the call was not given till six, when the woman had been dead some little time. That I am sure of, and you will see the report of the medical expert will uphold me."
"Then it was a third person who gave it?"
"Yes, and one who sought to have the crime discovered as soon as possible, and who reckoned on the officers coming from the Central Station, but did not expect Fandor or me to come back."
"Then according to you, sir, the murderer knew of your presence behind the curtain in the study while the crime was being committed."
"I can't tell about the murderer, but Doctor Chaleck certainly knew we were there. That man must have watched us all night, known the exact instant we left the house, and immediately afterwards got some one to telephone or must have done so himself."
Michel, becoming more and more convinced by Juve's reasoning, went on:
"At any rate, the existence of two studies, in all respects similar, goes to show a carefully premeditated plan, but there is something I can't account for. When you came back to the study where we found the dead woman, you found traces of mud by the window brought in by your shoes. You must therefore have been watching through the night the room where the crime was committed."
Juve was about to put in a word, but Michel, launched on his train of argument, continued:
"Allow me, sir; you are going, no doubt, to tell me that they might during your short absence have carried the body of the victim into the study in question, but I would point out to you, that on the loosened hair of the poor creature blood had caked, that some was on the carpet and had even gone through it to the flooring beneath. Now if they carried in the body just a little while before we discovered it, that would not have been the case."
Michel was delighted with his own argument. Juve smiled indulgently.
"My poor Michel," he cried, "you would bequite right if I put forward such an explanation. It is certain that the room in which we found the body was that in which the crime took place. It is therefore that in which we were not! As for the marks of mud near the window, they are ours, but transferred from the room in which we were into the room in which we were not! Which again proves that our presence was known to the culprits.
"Furthermore, the candle with which Doctor Chaleck melted the wax to seal his letters was scarcely used, it only burned in fact a few minutes. Now we found another candle in the same state. So you see that the precautions were well taken and everything possible done to lead us astray.
"We see the puppets moving—Loupart, Chaleck, Josephine, others maybe, but we do not see the strings."
"The strings which move them perhaps may be no other than—Fantômas," ventured Michel.
Juve frowned and suddenly fell silent. Then abruptly changing the conversation, he asked his lieutenant:
"You told me, did you not, that you could no longer appear in the character of the Sapper?"
"Quite true, Inspector, I was spotted just the day before the crime by Loupart, and so was my colleague, Nonet."
"Talking of that," answered Juve, "Nonet mentioned vaguely something about an affair at the docks, supposed to have been planned by the Beard and an individual known as the Cooper. Are you fully informed?"
"Unfortunately no, Inspector. I know no more about the matter than you do."
"And what is Nonet about now?"
"He has left for Chartres."
Juve shrugged his shoulders. He was annoyed. Perhaps if Léon, nicknamed Nonet, had not been transferred he would by now have obtained pertinent clues to the dock's affair.
After having enjoined Michel to devise a new disguise which allowed him to mix once more with the Band of Cyphers and going back to "The Good Comrades," Juve went down to the basement to supervise the workmen, who were now back; while Michel busied himself with the inventory of the papers found in Doctor Chaleck's study.
On leaving the house toward half-past seven in the evening Juve went slowly down to the Rue des Martyrs, pondering over the occurrences which for several days had succeeded each other with such startling rapidity.
As he reached the boulevards the bawling ofnewsboys attracted his attention. An ominous headline was displayed in the papers the crowd was struggling for.
"ANOTHER RAILROAD ACCIDENT.THE SIMPLON EXPRESS TELESCOPESTHE MARSEILLES LIMITED. MANYVICTIMS."
Juve anxiously bought a paper and scanned the list of the injured, fearful that Fandor would be found among the number. But as he read the details and learned that those in the detached carriage had escaped, he felt somewhat relieved. Hailing a taxi he drove off rapidly to the Prefecture in search of more precise information.
"A message for you, M. Juve."
The detective, hurrying home, was passing the porter's lodge. He pulled up short.
"For me?"
"Yes—it's certainly your name on the telegram."
Juve took the blue envelope with distrust and uneasiness. He had given his home address to no one. He glanced over the message, and gave a sigh of relief.
"The dear fellow," he muttered as he wentupstairs. "He's had a narrow escape; however, all's well than ends well."
After a hurried toilet and a bite of dinner, Juve set off again, jumped into a train for the Boulevard St. Germain and got down at the Jardin des Plantes. Then, sauntering casually along, he made for Bercy by the docks, which were covered as far as the eye could see with rows and rows of barrels.
About two hours later, Juve, who had been wandering about the vast labyrinth of wine-docks, began to grow impatient.
It was already fifty minutes past the appointed hour, and the detective began to feel uneasy. Why was Fandor so late? Something must surely have happened to him! And then what a queer idea to choose such a meeting place!
Suddenly, Juve started. He recalled his talk that afternoon with Michel; the reference made to the affair of the docks in which the Beard and the Cooper were implicated. What if he had been drawn into a trap!
The detective's reflections were suddenly cut short by unusual and alarming sounds.
He fancied he heard the shrill blast of a whistle, followed by the rush of footsteps and a collision of empty barrels.
Juve held his breath and crouched down under the shed in which he stood; he thought he saw the outline of a shadow passing slowly in the distance. Juve was stealthily following in its tracks when he caught a significant click.
"Two can play at that," he growled between his teeth, as he cocked his revolver. The shadow disappeared, but the footsteps went on.
Disguising his voice he called out: "Who goes there?"
A sharp summons answered him, "Halt!"
Juve was about to call upon his mysterious neighbour to do likewise, when a report rang out, at once followed by another. Juve saw where the shots came from. His assailant was scarcely fifteen paces from him, but luckily the shots had gone wide.
"Use up your cartridges, my friend," muttered Juve; "when your get to number six, it will be my turn."
The sixth shot rang out. This was the signal for Juve to spring forward. Leaping over the barrels, he made for the shadow which he espied at intervals. All at once he gave a cry of triumph. He was face to face with a man.
His cry, however, changed into amazement.
"You, Fandor?"
"Juve!"
"You've begun shooting at me, now, have you?"
For answer, the journalist held out his revolver, which was fully loaded.
"But what are you doing here, Juve?" he asked.
"You wired to me to come."
"That I never did."
Juve drew the telegram from his pocket and held it out to Fandor, but as the two men drew close together, they were startled by a lightning flash, and a report. A bullet whistled past their ears. Instinctively they lay flat between two barrels, holding their breaths.
Juve whispered instructions: "When I give the signal, fire at anything you see or toward the direction of the next report."
The two men slowly and noiselessly raised their heads.
"Ah," cried Juve.
And he fired at the rapidly fleeing figure.
"Did you see?" whispered Fandor, clutching Juve's arm. "It's Chaleck."
Juve was about to leap up and start in pursuit when a series of dull thuds, the overturning of barrels, stifled oaths and cracking planks smote his ear. These noises were followed by the measured footfall of a body of men drawing near, words of command and shrill whistles.
"What's all that now?" questioned Fandor.
"The best thing that could happen for us," replied Juve. "The police are coming. These quays are a refuge for all kinds of tramps and crooks who from time to time are rounded up. We are probably going to see a 'drive.'"
Juve had scarcely finished speaking when several shots rang out; these were followed by a general uproar and then a great blue flame suddenly rose, died away and flared up again. A thick smoke permeated the atmosphere.
"Fire," exclaimed Fandor.
"The kegs of alcohol are alight," added Juve.
The two had now to think of their own safety. Evidently bandits had been tracking them for more than an hour, guided by Doctor Chaleck.
But they soon found that their retreat was cut off by a ring of flames.
"Let us head for the Seine," suggested Fandor, who had discovered a break in the ring of fire at that point. A fresh explosion now took place. From a burst cask a spurt of liquid fire shot up, closing the circle. It had become impossible to pass through in any direction.
They heard the cries of the rabble, the whistles of the officers. In the distance the horns of the fire engines moaned dolefully. The heat was growing unbearable, and the ring enclosing Fandor and Juve narrowed more and more. Suddenly Juve pointed to an enormous empty puncheon that had just rolled beside them.
"Have you ever looped the loop?" he asked. "Hurry up now; in you go; we'll let it roll down the slope of the quay into the river."
In a few moments the cask was rolling at top speed. Juve and Fandor guessed by the crackling of the outer planks and by a sudden rise in the temperature that they were passing through the fire. All at once the great vat reached the level of the river. It plunged into the waves with a dull thud.
As he turned at the far side of the Pont St. Louis, Doctor Ardel, the celebrated medical jurist, caught sight of M. Fuselier, the magistrate, chatting with Inspector Juve in front of the Morgue.
"I am behind-hand, gentlemen. So sorry to have made you wait."
M. Fuselier and Juve crossed the tiny court and entered the semi-circular lecture-room, where daily lessons in medical jurisprudence are given to the students and the head men of the detective police force.
Doctor Ardel, piloting his guests, did the honours.
"The place is not exactly gay; in fact, it has an ill reputation; but anyhow, gentlemen, it is at your disposition. M. Fuselier, you will be able to investigate in peace: M. Juve, you will be at liberty to put any questions you choose to your client."
The doctor spoke in a loud voice, emphasising each word with a jolly laugh, good natured, devoid of malice, yet making an unpleasant impression on his two visitors less at home than he in the gruesome abode they had just entered.
"You will excuse me," he went on, "if I leave you for a couple of minutes to put on an overall and my rubber gloves?"
The doctor gone, the two instinctively felt a vague need to talk to counteract the doleful atmosphere the Morgue seemed to exhale, where so many unclaimed corpses, so much human flotsam, had come to sleep under the inquiring eyes of the crowd, before being given to the common ditch, being no more than an entry in a register and a date: "Body found so and so, buried so and so."
"Tell me, my dear Juve," asked M. Fuselier. "This morning directly I got your message I at once acceded to your wish and asked Ardel to have us both here this afternoon, but I hardly understand your object. What have you come here for?"
Juve, with both hands in his pockets, was walking up and down before the dissecting table. At the Magistrate's question he stopped short, and, turning to M. Fuselier, replied:
"Why have I come here? I scarcely knowmyself. It's everything or nothing. The key to the puzzle. I tell you, M. Fuselier, things are becoming increasingly tragic and baffling."
"How's that?"
"The part played by Josephine is less and less clear. She is Loupart's mistress; she informs against him, is fired at by him, then, according to Fandor, becomes in some manner his accomplice in a robbery so daring that you must search the annals of American criminality to find its like."
"You refer to the train affair?"
"Yes. Now, leaving Josephine on one side, we are confronted with two enigmas. Doctor Chaleck, a man of the world, a scholar, crops up as leader of a band of criminals. What we know for certain about him is that he fired at Josephine, that he was concerned in the affair of the docks—no more. There remains Loupart; and about him being the real culprit we know nothing. There is no proof that he killed the woman. In order to prove that we should have to know who that woman is and why she was killed, and also how. The how and why of the crime alone might chance to give us the answer."
"What trail are you following?"
"That of the dead woman. The body we are about to examine will determine me in which quarter to direct my search."
M. Fuselier, looking at the detective with a penetrating eye, asked:
"You surely haven't the notion of suspecting Fantômas?"
"You are right, M. Fuselier," he replied. "Behind Loupart, behind Chaleck, everywhere and always it is Fantômas I am looking for."
Whatever information the detective was about to impart to the magistrate was cut short by the return of Doctor Ardel. That gentleman, in donning the uniform of the expert, had resumed an appearance of professional gravity.
"We are going to work now, gentlemen," he announced. "I need not remind you, of course, that the body you are about to see, that of the woman found in the Cité Frochot, has already undergone certain changes due to decomposition, which have modified its aspect."
So saying, Dr. Ardel pressed a button and gave an attendant the necessary order. "Be so good as to bring the body from room No. 6."
Some minutes later a folding door in the wall opened and two men pushed a truck into the middle of the hall upon which lay the corpse of the unknown.
"I now give over the dead woman to you to identify," declared Doctor Ardel. "My examination has been carried out and my part asexpert is over—I am ready to hand in my report."
Fuselier and Juve bent long over the slab upon which the body had been placed.
"Alas!" cried Juve, "how recognise anything in this countenance destroyed by pitch? What discover in these crushed limbs, this human form, which is now a shapeless mass?" And, turning to Dr. Ardel, he questioned:
"Professor, what did you learn from your autopsy?"
"Nothing, or very little," replied the doctor. "Death was not due to one blow more than another. A general effusion of blood took place everywhere at once."
"Everywhere at once? What do you mean by that?" questioned Juve.
"Gentlemen, that is the exact truth. In dissecting this body I was surprised to find all the blood vessels burst, the heart, the veins, the arteries, even the lung cells. More than this, the very bones are broken, splintered into a vast number of little pieces. Lastly, both on the limbs and over the whole body I find a general ecchymosis, reaching from the top of the neck to the lower extremities."
"But," objected Juve, who feared the professor might linger over technical details too complex for him, "what general notion does this suggest to you as to the cause of death?"
"A strange idea, M. Juve, and one it is not easy for me to define. You might say that the body of this woman had passed under the grinders of a roller! The body is 'rolled,' that is just the word, crushed all over, and there is no point where the pressure might be conjectured to have been greatest."
M. Fuselier looked at Juve.
"What can we deduce from that?" he asked.
"Professor Ardel demonstrates scientifically the same doubts to which a rough inspection led me. How did the murderer go to work? It becomes more and more of a mystery."
"It is so much so," declared Professor Ardel, "that even by postulating the worst complications I really cannot conceive of any machine capable of thus crushing a human being."
"I do not believe," declared the magistrate, "that we have any more to see here. It is plain, Juve, that this corpse cannot furnish any clues to you and me for the inquest."
"The corpse, no," cried Juve, "but there is something else."
Then, turning to the professor, he asked:
"Could you have brought to us the clothes this woman wore?"
"Quite easily."
From a bag that an attendant handed him Juve drew out the garments of the dead woman. The shoes were by a good maker, the silk stockings with open-work embroidery, the chemise and the drawers were of fine linen and the corset was well cut.
"Nothing," he cried, "not a mark on this linen nor even the name of the shop where it was bought."
He examined her petticoat, her bodice, a sort of elegant blouse, trimmed with lace, and the velvet collar which had several spots of blood upon it. He then drew a small penknife from his pocket and, kneeling on the floor, proceeded to probe the seams. Suddenly he uttered a muffled exclamation:
"Ah! What's this?" From the lining of the bodice he drew out a thin roll of paper, crumpled, stained with blood, torn unfortunately.
"Goodness of God in whom I trust—I do not wish to die with this remorse—I do not wish to risk his killing me to destroy this secret—I write this confession, I will tell him it is deposited in a safe place—yes, I was the cause of the death of that hapless actor! Yes, Valgrand paid for the crime which Gurn committed.... Yes, I sent Valgrand to the scaffold by making him pass forGurn—Gurn who killed Lord Beltham, Gurn, who I sometimes think must be Fantômas!"
"Goodness of God in whom I trust—I do not wish to die with this remorse—I do not wish to risk his killing me to destroy this secret—I write this confession, I will tell him it is deposited in a safe place—yes, I was the cause of the death of that hapless actor! Yes, Valgrand paid for the crime which Gurn committed.... Yes, I sent Valgrand to the scaffold by making him pass forGurn—Gurn who killed Lord Beltham, Gurn, who I sometimes think must be Fantômas!"
Juve read these lines in an agitated voice, and as he came to the signature he turned pale and was obliged to stop.
"What is the matter?"
"It is signed—'Lady Beltham.'"
In order that Doctor Ardel, understanding nothing of Juve's agitation, might grasp that import of the paper just discovered he would have had to call to mind the appalling tragedy which three years before had stirred the whole world with its bloody vicissitude and mystery, one not solved to that hour.
"Lady Beltham!"
At that name Juve called up the whole blood-curdling past! He saw in fancy the English lady[A]whose husband was murdered by the Canadian Gurn, who perhaps was her lover.
And Juve, following his train of thought, pondered that he had accused this same lady of having, to save her lover, the very day the guillotine was erected on the boulevard, found means to send in his stead the innocent actor, Valgrand.
And here in connection with this affair of the Cité Frochot he found Lady Beltham involved inthe puzzle of which he was so keenly seeking the key.
Juve again read the momentous paper he had just unearthed.
"By Jove, it was plain," ran his thought, "the lady, criminal though she might be, was first and foremost Fantômas' passionate inamorata. And this paper he held in his hands was the tail end of her confession—the remains of a document in which in a fit of moral distress she had avowed her remorse and made known the truth."
And taking line by line the cryptic statement, Juve asked himself further:
"What do these phrases signify? How extract the whole truth from these few words? 'I do not want him to kill me in order to destroy that secret'! When Lady Beltham wrote that she was angry with Gurn. Then again what did this other doubtful expression mean?—'Gurn who I sometimes fancy may be Fantômas.' She did not know then the precise identity of her lover! Oh, the wretch! To what depths had she sunk?"
Then as he put this query to himself, Juve shook from head to foot. Like a thunderclap he thought he grasped the truth he had followed so eagerly. What had become of Lady Beltham? Must he not come to the conclusion that thiswoman whose face had been crushed out of all recognition by the murderer was none other than the lady? How else explain the discovery in her bodice of the betraying document? Who but she could have had it in her possession? Who else could have so sedulously concealed it?
Juve read over another clause: "I will tell him it is deposited in a safe place."
Feverishly Juve took up the garments trailing on the ground, carefully explored the fabric, made a minute search.
"It is impossible," he thought, "that I should not find another document. The beginning of this confession—I must have it!"
All at once he stopped short in his search. "Curse it all!" And he pointed out to M. Fuselier, disguised in the lining of a loose pocket in the petticoat—a fresh hiding place, but torn and alas! empty.
This woman had split up her confession into several portions. And if she was killed it was certainly to strip her of these compromising papers. Well, the murderer had attained his object.
"Look, Fuselier, this empty 'cache' is the proof of what I put forward, and chance alone allowed the page concealed in the collar of this bodice to fall into my hands."
Long did the detective still grope and ponder,heedless of the questions the professor and the magistrate kept asking him. He rose at last, and with a distracted gesture took the arm of M. Fuselier, and dragged him before the stone slab on which the corpse, but recently unknown, smiled a ghastly smile.
"M. Fuselier, the dead woman has spoken. She is Lady Beltham. This is the body of Lady Beltham!"
The magistrate recoiled in horror. He murmured:
"But who then can Doctor Chaleck be? Who can Loupart be?"
Juve replied without hesitation.
"Ask Fantômas the names of his accomplices!"
And leaving him and Doctor Ardel without any farewell Juve rushed from the Morgue, his features so distorted that as they passed him people drew aside, amazed and murmuring:
"A madman or a murderer!"